Seventeen-year-old Francie Nelson is charming, saucy, and spoiled. Her father thinks it would be a good idea for her to see how other people live—in this case, the other people are the English. So she packs up and, with heels dragging the whole way, travels to what looks, at first, like the land of gloom.

Her British fog lifts when she meets some boys. If only she didn't feel so dumb and dumpy in Fairfields' school uniform! But, like her English hosts, she keeps a stiff upper lip. It's all she can do to control that lip when a school chum named Jennifer refers to her as a "Yank."

With the help of a friend she meets on a cruise, Francie adjusts in a tough boarding school where she faces prejudice, anxiety, and loneliness. She begins to experience more and more ups, until at last, she realizes she has grown emotionally, and has transformed herself.